Daniel Barnes Quartet

First Tuesday and every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday throughout the Winter, The Home Smith Bar at the Old Mill Toronto showcases some of the most important entertainers on today’s jazz scene performing for your pleasure in the cozy intimacy of one of Toronto’s best-loved lounges.

Drummer, percussionist, composer, vocalist, producer DANIEL BARNES “stands with the best of (his) generation in Canada” (Mark Miller, Globe and Mail). Daniel Barnes “knows his way with a tune” said AllAboutJazz.com. “Barnes compositions specialize in relentlessly thrusting music of broad appeal and warmth that give bandsmen broad latitude to wail” said The Toronto Star.

The latter accolades both refer to Barnes’ 2007 release “Classic Beauties”, a CD that celebrates the mainstream acoustic jazz tradition through eight original compositions.

“Culmination” his debut CD released in 2003 has a broader focus stylistically which WholeNote Magazine called a “varied and interesting programme” that is “consistently rewarding”. Both self produced CDs have done well as radio favorites on JAZZ.FM91, reaching #9 on National College Radio, and playing regularly across the nation on the CBC.

Daniel Barnes’ group has played the Toronto and Montreal International Jazz Festivals and many others. His drumming supports a top echelon of jazz artists in Canada including Joe Sealy, Richard Underhill,Jane Bunnett, Holy Cole, Micah Barnes, John Alcorn, Heather Bambrick, and Carol Welsman as well as visiting Americans Don Braden, Dizzy Reese, Ron Westray and Rick Margitza. He has earned distinction in World Music circles having toured internationally for a decade with one of Ethiopia’s biggest pop stars, Ms. Aster Aweke while here at home was a member of the Flying Bulgar Klezmer Band, earning a Juno nomination in 2003 for “Sweet Return”.

This evening’s stellar DANIEL BARNES QUARTET features jazz masters WILLIAM SPERANDEI on trumpet, EWAN FARNCOMBE on piano, PAUL NOVOTNY on bass, and DANIEL BARNES (drums), entertaining in the up-close-and-personal ambience of the Home Smith Bar.